Game of the Month

As June draws to a close, I’m back with a second look back at the history of Monolith Soft and the games they created over the last generation of Nintendo consoles – with the exception of the actual Game of the Month. This was a period of change for the company and saw the release of several more experimental titles. Bandai Namco sold the majority of their stock in Monolith Soft to Nintendo in 2007 and while they wouldn’t become a first-party developer until later, all games from this point on would be on Nintendo consoles. Despite this, Monolith would still keep close ties with their previous owner, who took on publishing duties for some of their more niche games. Following the release of Baten Kaitos Origins there was a gap of two years before Monolith Soft’s next title – Soma Bringer.

It’s safe to say that Mario Kart 8 takes more than a few cues from F-Zero. Nintendo’s other racing franchise that started out on the SNES gets comparatively little love nowadays, but several features from this series have worked their way into the latest Mario Kart. The new racetracks are the most obvious influence, with gravity-defying courses that are straight out of F-Zero (quite literally in the case of some of the DLC), but the new 200cc class brings Mario Kart’s speed just a little bit closer to its older brother. Heck, you can even play as a Mii approximation of Captain Falcon if you can track down his elusive amiibo. But for all the inspiration that Mario Kart 8 takes from F-Zero, the two series remain distinctly different. Some people are claiming that Mario Kart is now an adequate replacement for the currently MIA F-Zero (and by some people I mean just one guy on Neogaf), but taking a look at the design philosophy behind both titles shows that they’re completely at odds with each other.

So let’s get down the to serious-and-yet-unserious side of Monster Hunter. Monster Hunter as a franchise has had a long history of games, starting in 2004 with the original entry, to a decade later with Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate. I have always been intrigued by the series and have enjoyed numerous forays into the wild to hunt many monsters, but I have generally felt that there was something missing. I always enjoyed the fact that the games have had an air of silly humor via some of their support characters, and that they have even given you various minions to help you along the way, but none of these bits of charm have made me smile as much as much as the Palicoes in the latest entry, Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate! Who knew that a furry little critter could make such a difference; could this be what this series has been missing?

Felyne’s – small, bipedal cat creatures – have various roles in Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate, but the bravest of them all are named “Palicoes”. These furry hunting companions will travel with you during solo quests, as well as with you and one other hunter and their chosen felyne warrior. You select and create your Palico at the beginning of the game right alongside your own character, choosing their color, markings, and even bestowing upon them a name. I took the latter very seriously as I thought long and hard about my felyne companion; I wanted every aspect of my choices to be just right. After probably way to much time and thought (I honestly think I spent more time on him then my own character), I made my decisions and my furry little friend and I set off on what would prove to be some wild adventures!

Ah, is it Monday again? Well alright, I can deal with that, but only because our game of the month this March is so wonderful. I bring you: Monster Hunter March! A whole month of features dedicated to talking about Capcom’s latest series entry, the series as a whole, and plenty more. You’re bound to learn something new about it over the next few weeks as our writers provide varying perspectives and observations about the game.

This month’s articles will include an in-depth comparison between Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate on 3DS and Monster Hunter Tri on Wii, a perspective on the game from “a super beginner”, a look at how Monster Hunter 4 creates fanaticism despite how intimidating and broken it can look from the outside, and an adorable exposé on your Palico sidekicks from the latest entry on 3DS. Look forward to all of it!

As usual, if you have an article you’d like to write about Monster Hunter this month, please use the contact form to send us an email with your idea and if we like we’ll get back to you. How can you not love this game? It’s the best.

If you ask someone what the most striking and memorable thing about The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask is, they’d probably answer with the whole three-day cycle gimmick, Link’s many transformations or the creepy moon. But if you held a gun to their head and whispered “it’s Tingle” into their ear, they’d undoubtedly say it was this charming fellow. The life and legacy of Tingle isn’t extensively documented and leaves many unexplored questions. Is he human? Is he a fairy? Is he an offensive gay stereotype? But despite his mysterious nature, Tingle is a crucial character to the development of the Legend of Zelda series. In fact, there are no less than four different games out there with Tingle’s name in the title, which makes him just as important to the franchise as Link, whose name usually only appears as part of a lame pun. Just as the tale of the Hero of Time and the Triforce is constantly being retold, so too is the story of this unsung legend.

The clock has progressed beyond the point of midnight where I live, and as far as I’m concerned that means it’s The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask 3D release day! We have a special way of celebrating game releases on NintendoEverything, and this month is no different. That’s right, February’s Game of the Month is going to be Majora’s Mask itself in all its oddities and wisdom and enjoyability and all of that other stuff. It’s an excellent game, and I hope you want to learn a lot about it that you didn’t know before; that’s what Game of the Month is for.

This month’s article schedule:

“More than you ever wanted to know about Tingle,” from Patrick on February 14th.“Termina’s Landmarks,” from Scott on February 21st“Untitled,” from Vincent on February 22nd“Do we want more Zelda remakes? Will we get more?,” from Kira on February 28th

As usual, if you have an article you’d like to write about Majora’s Mask this month, please use the contact form to send us an email with your idea and if we like we’ll get back to you. How can you not love this game? It’s the best. Best Zelda game. Best game. Best thing. I love it.

When it was released back in 2003, the first WarioWare title was praised by critics for its innovative manner of transforming a series of minigames into an addictive gauntlet of five-second challenges. The surprise Game Boy Advance hit introduced the world to its unique bite-sized forms of gameplay, a variety of visual styles, a new cast of characters and enka music, but some of its more “innovative” aspects actually originated from earlier Nintendo experiments. It makes sense that a weird game would have a weird history behind it, and in WarioWare’s case it comes from one of the weirdest consoles – the Nintendo 64 Disk Drive.

This week, Scott dives into our Game of the Month with a video about each character in the original WarioWare. Fascinatingly, he tries to pin down the style of each one and their microgames, which lead me to learn that Dr. Crygor’s are definitely my favorite. Nothing can beat that photorealism…

Here’s a question though: Which style of minigame suits you best, and which character’s games do you like the most? Did you ever really notice a difference in style between all the characters?

Mario was always the character who got to sit in the spotlight. Wanna go karting? Sure, but only if it’s called MARIO Kart. Wanna spend a day playing tennis? Of course you can, but it has to be called MARIO Tennis. Hell, even a social gathering has to be called a Mario Party. So after years of watching his childhood best friend get all the attention while he sat there doing nothing, it didn’t take too long before Wario started thinking of ways to get his own time to shine, and what better way is there to be the star of your own video game series than to have once with your name in it!? So let’s spend today reminiscing the history of Wario’s series, and see what made them so special.